Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Get the picture

In Ma'ariv yesterday, they printed a picture that shows a Settler woman punching a grimacing policeman in the face. The caption says she is raising her hands against the policeman.

Of course, if Ma'ariv had shown the entire photograph, the picture and caption would look a little different.

You would have seen the policeman grimacing from exertion as he was apparently exerting force on the neck of the settler he was choking and the woman perhaps is trying to free the person in the red shirt that the policeman is hurting. It may or may not be her hand, but it doesn't appear that the hand is hitting the policeman at all (and there were no reports filed of any policemen getting hit either).

But hey, you gotta believe what they show and tell you - which I presume is also why they want to shut down Yisrael Hayom.

UPDATE: Dec. 20, 2009. The woman in the photo is Mrs. Tziki Blonder of Tzufim. She is suing Ma'ariv for NIS 50,000 and an apology. According to Mrs. Blonder, she arrived at the scene to see policemen violently beating up some kids, including her 2 children. She began screaming at the policeman to stop touching the girls and using violence.

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JERUSALEM — Angry settlers beat and seriously injured a female Israeli police officer Tuesday, police said, as she tried to enforce a government ban on new housing construction in Jewish West Bank settlements.

Police spokesman Gil Elhadad said about 100 settlers, most of them teenagers, burned tires and blocked the entrance to the settlement of Tsofit, in the northern part of the West Bank near the line with Israel. He said some of them jumped the police officer and beat her, breaking several ribs. She was taken to a hospital for treatment of serious injuries, he said. He did not give her name or age.

The Tzofim settlement, which is on the WESTERN side of the "security fence" has many lots on it which are in the process of having homes built.

One lot, which has fully approved and authorized building permits was continuing lot preparation for the foundations to be poured. The police arrived to confiscate the bulldozer/tractor which was working on the lot.

The tractor was working there legally, but the defense ministry doesnt really care about that since it LOOKED bad for them.

The police showed up, with the yasam meaner-than-hell police. The residents burned tires and tried to prevent the police from confiscating the tractor. The police exerted tremendous force in throwing the residents out of their way in order to bring in a truck which would remove the tractor.

A female border guard was hurt in the stomach, though the settlers claim she wasn't intentionally hurt -- the residents were simply trying to protect themselves from being hurt by an overly brutal police force, and prevent the tractor from being removed.

My son was on the MDA ambulance which treated the soldier and took her to the hospital.

Tzofim is a mixed religious and secular settlement, and relatively moderate. They demonstrated since the police were coming to stop work on an lot which had all the necessary permits. When Ehud Barak and the police acts like animals to stop legal construction, do you expect people to simply welcome the police into your neighborhood with tea and coffee?

I'm not sure I see what you are trying to achieve here by posting the 'uncensored' image.

I see a policeman being prevented from carrying out the orders he has been given, which are to enable other civil servants to do the job the government has charged them to do. He's struggling with at least two protesters- the guy in the orange shirt (pinning the policeman's arms) and the guy standing in brown (charging his shoulder). And while the two of them have his arms, the woman appears to be threatening (at best) a punch to his unguarded face. He looks concerned.